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Jordan Witzigreuter, better known as The Ready Set, has a new single coming out on May 22nd — ‘Give Me Your Hand (Best Song Ever)’ — and Myspace has an exclusive look at the album artwork, pictured above. We recently caught up with Jordan to talk about his new single, his production process, and his impossible-to-pronounce last name.

MYSPACE: You just concluded a tour that had something like 24 dates in five weeks. How on Earth were you able to do that? Are you still recovering?
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JORDAN WITZIGREUTER: Actually, yeah, It’s really awesome. I think I’m at the point now where I’m so used to constantly being on the road that it’s like, I won’t really have to recover. But it was really fun, I had a good time.
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Your new track ‘The Ready Set’ … can you tell us about it? Is it similar to what you’ve done before, or are you going in a different direction?
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It’s a little bit different than stuff I’ve done before. It’s a little more dancey, but I think it definitely has a distinct vibe to it, [with] the singing/rap kind of stuff …. So it’s kind of basically everything [I’ve done before] lumped into one song, so I’m excited about it.
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The Ready Set is just you … can you talk a little about your production process and what kind of equipment you use?
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Yeah, it’s just me. So basically, most of the time what I do is I kind of like do a demo on my laptop, but everything I do is all through logic on a macbook. I usually don’t use anything other than a computer unless there’s some sort of organic instrument – guitars, drums. But for this song, I just kind of worked on it from scratch with a friend of mine named Andrew Goldstein, just going back and forth with different sounds and just messing with the track forever. It actually took a really long time to get everything perfected. I don’t even know how many mixes we made.
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For those who might not be familiar with your catalog of music, what songs would you recommend they listen to in order to get a feel for your musical style?
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Listen to a song called ‘There Are Days’ off my first album, and then listen to a song called ‘Killer’ off my EP I just called Feel Good Now.
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You draw incorporate elements of indie, pop, electronic, and hip-hop into your music, can you talk about some of your influences? It seems like it’d be an eclectic list.
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I try to take in everything I hear one way or another. I think that’s the best way to get inspiration. Like I try not to draw everything from one specific point, and continuously limit yourself that way. So yeah, I listen to the radio, a bunch of old stuff, random things I find on iTunes…just sort of drawing inspiration from everything possible. I grew up listening to a lot more rock stuff.
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So I think my songwriting process or my structure might follow more of a rock kind of format. But yeah, it’s just kind of everything. Being very open-minded and trying to listening to everything possible.
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Is there a specific band or singer you listen to that people might not necessarily think would be a big influence on you?
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Yeah, actually. Saves The Day … that was one of the bands that got me into more pop-structure sort of music when I was growing up. I guess at this point, I listen to a ton of hip-hop, so maybe in some way more so in a production or track way I guess I could kind of say I draw from those sounds.
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In January you were named the most animal-friendly band (which is kind of funny and awesome considering The Ready Set is just you). Could you talk a little bit about your campaign with PETA?
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Yeah, it’s actually interesting, because I’m not a vegetarian; I’m not really a vegan or anything. SO I think in that case, I kind of got involved with PETA through their fur campaign and animal abuse. It was never super-based on vegetarianism or that sort of thing. I try not to be too outspoken because I don’t want people to think I’m just trying to get attention through PETA or anything. But they’re cool, and I think it’s awesome that they’re open to letting people who aren’t following the exact PETA guidelines be involved.
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So will this track be part of a new album? If so, when can we expect that?
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Yeah, actually I just got to L.A. yesterday, and I’m just finishing up the album and hope to have it out in the fall. So far I’ve got about 25 songs that are coming around, and there’s going to be bunch more, and I hope to come out with something awesome.
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On average, how many tries does it take someone to correctly pronounce your last name?
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I mean, it’s kind of hit or miss. There’s been some people that get it right the first time. That’s pretty rare. People kind of get about maybe 70% right, but they’ll add an extra ‘V’ or some letter that’s not really there. I kind of wish I would have made up some shorter stage name or something.
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What’s your biggest guilty pleasure music? Or, what would you listen to while you’re cleaning your room that you might not necessarily advertise in front of your friends?
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I’m pretty open about most of the stuff I’m into. I definitely don’t have anything I don’t want anyone to find out about. It’s not a guilty pleasure to me but maybe it would be to some dudes, but I’m a big fan of Taylor Swift. Definitely love her.
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‘Give Me Your Hand (Best Song Ever)’ will be available for download starting May 22nd.